Country taking steps to shore up exports

Tech-intensive green products, supportive policy measures and private companies' expansion in emerging markets will effectively drive the exports of China's foreign trade powerhouses in the second half of this year, according to government officials and market watchers.

Shanghai, Beijing and the provinces of Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shandong — the major export-oriented powerhouses in the country — each saw their total import and export values exceed 1 trillion yuan ($139.29 billion) in the first five months of this year. All of them maintained growth during this period, data from the General Administration of Customs showed.

Over the first five months of this year, Guangdong remained No 1 in China in terms of its foreign trade value, which stood at 3.19 trillion yuan, while Shanghai's total import and export value reached 1.74 trillion yuan, a record for the city.

Acknowledging that the pressure on Guangdong's foreign trade imports and exports is still relatively heavy, Li Kuiwen, head of the Guangdong Office of the GAC, said that propelled by favorable factors, including the gradual recovery of market demand and continuous confidence growth among business entities, Guangdong's foreign trade will maintain its development resilience and show a trend of overall stability with minor fluctuations each month.

Impacted by multiple headwinds, such as a weakening demand for goods and geoeconomic fragmentation, China's foreign trade grew at a slower pace than expected in May, while the country's total export and import value expanded 0.5 percent to 3.45 trillion yuan, data from the GAC showed.

Eager to help further stabilize social expectations and boost confidence in foreign trade, the GAC said earlier this month that it had launched 16 initiatives to encourage the country's exporters to ship more products to other parts of the world.

Efforts have been made to improve the efficiency of cross-border logistics, advance the import and export of important agricultural and food products, facilitate export tax rebates and enhance the upgrading of trade processing, as well as optimize the supervision of trade in China's border areas, said Wu Haiping, director-general of the GAC's department of general operation.

The GAC introduced 23 measures to stabilize foreign trade last year, providing solid support to bring the scale of China's foreign trade to a record high.

"Next, the GAC will focus on the implementation of the 16 new initiatives, urge local Customs branches to introduce supporting measures, devise targeted solutions for difficulties faced by exporters and strengthen the implementation of policies, as well as gather feedback," Wu said.

China's pursuit of the high-quality development of three tech-intensive green products — solar batteries, lithium-ion batteries and electric vehicles — will be the major driver of its foreign trade this year, said Chen Bin, deputy director of the expert committee at the China Machinery Industry Federation in Beijing.

As a symbol of China's improved trade structure and high-quality trade growth, the rising presence of green exports over the past decade also revealed the competitive edge and potential of their respective sectors.

For instance, manufacturers in Jiangsu saw their exports of solar cells, lithium batteries and new energy vehicles surge 8 percent, 64.3 percent and 541.6 percent year-on-year, respectively, between January and May, with a combined export value of 87.89 billion yuan, data from Nanjing Customs showed.

This transformation has created many growth points for private companies to expand their market presence in countries in the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia and Europe, said Zhou Maohua, an analyst with the China Everbright Bank.